A Passion for Potions (Petalfall #1)

17. Seventeen - A Sentimental Thief

Seventeen - A Sentimental Thief

Viggo

Dorrian glares at me—as much as a Dryad can with his wooden eyes—and doesn’t budge.

His handle is gone and I am not about to start trying to pry him open at the jamb.

“I’m not going for a visit, I just need to collect something.”

If he had arms, I’m certain they would be crossed. “You have a guest coming, you can’t go gallivanting halfway across the country.”

“It’s barely fifty miles, and it will take me ten minutes, no more.”

The door doesn’t budge. “What is it that’s so important you have to leave right now?”

I could tell him, but the whole house is in such a frenzy over her... I don’t want to add to the fervor.

“Let him go.” Penny says, not looking up from the letter he is reading as he passes by us. “I can promise you that he will come back as quickly as he can.”

“What if your sister closes me?” Dorrian asks, creaking—the only sign that he’s considering giving in.

“Then you can open yourself back up.” I exhale and hold on to my last hope. “Please, Dorrian. I just want to get something and come right back. I will ignore Kirra if I see her. I’ll pretend she’s a ghost I can’t hear.” I’ve done it before.

I’ll avoid her as well as I can so that I don’t have to do any of that.

The door grumbles and groans, but he reforms his knob and lets me haul him open.

I leave him ajar behind me and check to make sure I still see back into our home when I step into my sister’s.

Moving like a thief, I slip through the abandoned, cobweb strewn servants passages and go to the room she keeps for me.

It houses all of the little things I cannot get rid of—and wouldn’t want to if I could—as well as the remnants of some of our parents’ things. Family heirlooms and trinkets.

It is one of those that I’m after.

The room is tidy, neatly dusted, and only four things are not where I left them.

Whatever Kirra was looking for, I doubt it is what I am here to collect and I don’t think she’ll have found it if she was.

I have to move the antique vanity out from the wall to access the hidden compartment, and then go around to the little details on the front poking different pieces of scrollwork in the right order until…

The hidden catch in the back of the vanity springs loose and I snatch the box from its hiding place. I can feel, simply by the weight of it, that the contents are still in place, and I slide it into my pocket before searching the rest of the room for a decoy, just in case she does stop me.

There are boxes of tat aplenty to choose from, but in the end I find something that Penny has been asking for for ages.

I certainly could have come for the book that I pluck from a shelf with so many others I have never been tempted to read.

The Care and Keeping of Night Needle Pines certainly holds no interest for me... and it will only distract Penny when he could be seeing to my care and keeping.

Hoo

I look up at the fat owl sitting atop the footboard of the covered bed.

“Hello, little spy.”

Hoo

It hoots one more time before it leaps to flight and disappears into the dark hallway.

I need to leave.

The owl can’t tell her what I was doing, but it will let her know someone is here.

Chuckling, I take the book and head back for the door.

But I hear Kirra before I get close.

Dorrian likes my sister—most creatures do—but when I slip out of the dark servant’s hallway, she stands with her hands on her hips, locked in a glaring match with the dryad.

The owl on her shoulder swivels its head to stare at me with its enormous yellow eyes.

Hoo

It hoots, low and hollow. This one is small and white.

“You have not been invited to dinner.” Dorrian says.

He has grown a branch-like appendage that both holds him ajar and stops Kirra from pushing her way in.

“I am family,” she says, turning to look at me. “Do I need to be invited?”

“Tonight, yes. And unfortunately, there is no room.”

Hoo

The owl hoots again. I don’t know this one’s name.

Turning to me fully, she plucks the book from my hand, studying it, opening it and shaking it out, just in case there is something between the pages.

“Am I not invited because there are too many guests? Or because it is a truly private affair?”

“The latter.” I tell her, because she isn’t going to let me go until she’s gotten a little satisfaction. “We have a guest coming and we are, none of us—you included—ready for you to meet her.”

“Oh?”

Hoo

Penny might think me foolish for giving her that much. I can see in the way her eyes sparkle that her curiosity is more than piqued.

“I promise you will know everything as soon as we are able to tell you.” I try to angle around her.

“And when will I be allowed to come to dinner?”

“Soon. I promise.”

She points at me. “Be sure you follow through on that promise, little brother . Or I will come calling unannounced and ask whatever sweet little elf lady you’ve picked out of your bed all the embarrassing questions you don’t want me to.”

She moves out of my way and when I step through, just before Dorrian closes between us, I say, “She’s not an elf.”

The closing portal cuts off her indignant cry and a sharper hoot.

“You are going to pay for that,” Penny says, taking the book when I hand it to him. “Thank you. I’ve only been asking for seven years.”

“I told you I’d get around to it.”

Chuckling, Penny kisses me and his fingers quest in my pants pocket. I don’t stop him from pulling the box free.

I don’t stop him from opening it.

He looks at what’s inside, smiling before he snaps it closed and hands it back to me. “Not tonight.”

“I know.” I’ve promised him patience. “I just want to be prepared.”